


Familial Obligations

by Emony



Series: Colby Turner Granger [7]
Category: Numb3rs, Pirates of the Caribbean
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-10
Updated: 2010-01-10
Packaged: 2017-10-06 02:25:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/48693
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emony/pseuds/Emony
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Don's doing the go-between thing again with his Dad and Charlie.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Familial Obligations

**Author's Note:**

> First posted 17 August 2007

Don watched as his brother started writing away in chalk across the one empty board in his office. Face deliberately away as if, for once, he knew what conversation it was that they were about to have.

"Charlie? Charlie, are you listening to me?"

"Yes, Don," he answered, still writing.

"Dad's worried about you."

"Dad's always worried about me."

"This time it's different."

"Why?"

"Because it is. Because this time-"

Charlie's shoulders hunched up as he interrupted,

"Because this time it's an answer he might not like?"

"No, yes, no. He-"

"He's worried that I'm not staying at home mooning over Amita?"

"What happened to her? You were all about her and then suddenly Sparrow appears and it's all about him and Colby?"

"It was never about Amita. You just thought it was and it was, it was good cover."

"Good cover? Charlie, those aren't your words."

"They are, Don, they are. You said once that I was no good at keeping secrets. Now you're pissed because you've found just how good I am it. And Dad's pissed because now he's got even less chance of grandkids."

"No, I-, he's not and I'm not."

"You are, Don. But you don't need to be. This is me, this is who I am. They are in my life."

Don realised suddenly that he was right, that this time he was finally seeing who his little brother had grown up to be. When he'd returned to LA Charlie had been who he had expected him to be. He had reacted to everything in the ways he expected, and sure, some of that was the truth, but some of that was all because it was what he wanted to see.

"Did Mom, did she know?"

"About the NSA? No. That there was someone, someones, in my life? She knew something. She could never not know really. She was Mom."

"That she was, buddy, that she was."

It was going to take a while to sink in, and maybe he'd never understand it all, but this was how it was. Didn't mean he couldn't moan about to everyone else, though.

"Hold on a second, grandkids?"

"What about them?"

"Less chance?"

Charlie finally looked at him and gave him a well worn 'how stupid are you' look.

"You could still-"

"Don, I know you got that C in Physics but you got a B in Biology, you've got to know that three men can't make a baby."

Don snorted and rolled his eyes at his little brother,

"There's such things as surrogates, you could give him grandkids that way."

"Ha! You're not getting out of this one, it's all down to you now."

"But-"

"Don, I forgot to leave the house for months once, how well would I do with a kid? Besides, Colby's got to have one some day, maybe."

"He what?"

"Sure, it's this family thing, there's always got to be a, one of them through the main line. And Jack's already had his one for the century."

"He has to have a kid for the sake of the family, that's no reason to bring a kid into the world, Charlie. Huh, Century?"

"Century? Did I say that, um, it's this joke he had with-"

Don held up a hand to stop his brother, some things it seemed, he still couldn't lie about.

"Charlie, stop. Some of the stuff he's said, Colby's said, even you, there's stuff that doesn't add up. I don't want to know. But, I do know that he's older than he looks."

He ignored the flash in his memory of that ornate flask and the disappearing cut. He had promised the man he wouldn't tell either Charlie or Colby a thing. Maybe this way he could get some answers.

"Fine, but you didn't get that from me. An old friend of his, way back, found out he'd fathered a child. She made him promise he'd only ever have a child a century, the world didn't need that many more Sparrow's."

"And he just promised that?"

"For her, he would."

"Oh, big love of his life type?" If Sparrow had been telling his brother about some woman he was still in love with he was-

"Not his life." Charlie answered quickly, as if he could read Don's mind, "Anyway, Jack's done his bit this century, well, last century and he usually waits until the last one has had a kid before he has another."

"Does this kid know their Dad is, you know-"

"Old or bi?" Charlie asks him, and he can hear the grin.

"Uh, either?"

"Yes and yes. And you've met him."

Catching his brother's wince at what he'd let out he jumped on it,

"I have?"

The phone rang and Don saw the relief spread across his brother's face as he picked it up,

"Hey, Colby. Sure, I'll tell him. Yeah, see you."

As he put the phone down he started grabbing things and shoving them into his satchel,

"Colby says to switch your phone on, to stop stalking me and get back to the office, you've got a case. Tell Dad I'll see him tomorrow. I have a student to talk to."

He was half way out the door before Don had processed half of what he'd said,

"Hey! Charlie! You can't just say and that and walk away!"

"I can!" he shouted from half way down the hall. _That little-_


End file.
